Another how much soap to take thread...

[gunsmithgirl]

O.K. so I am prepping for an up coming event that steady draws between 100,000 - 150,000 people, lasts 3 days Fri- Sun. How much soap would you take to that size event? I also do lotions,body butters,salves, and lip balms. Haven't done an event this size before mostly just local farmers markets so I am not sure what to expect........

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

How many people come to the markets that you do do (hee hee, do do!) and how much soap do you sell? How many competitors (of all types, candles, soap etc) are at the big one and how many at the small one? How much soap do you have and how much can you make between now and then?

I don't sell yet and have not done a market/show, but I would rather have too much than not enough

 

[Dorymae]

I would agree you can't take too much but you can take too little. Now you don't have to put it all out on the table at once. You can put out enough so your table looks full then keep your extras in boxes under your table (hidden by your table covering of course). If I were unsure of what to expect I would take everything I could store reasonably. Yes you might haul most of it back with you, but that is better than running out and then having lots of people ask for it and be disappointed you don't have any. (You never want to give the impression that you run out of product often or people will not think of you as a reliable source.)

 

[bodybym]

I've heard that you should plan to bring enough product to sell 1 item for 10-20% of the estimated attendance. That being said, I have worked days and night preparing for a show where I sold very little, and then other shows where I have just brought what I had because it was a "small" show and sold out of quite a few items.

For the first day I make sure that I have a minimum of 8 each of soaps, and 5 of all liquid products (that is for each scent). I find that is a good starting place, and then I can bring in more each day as I need it.

I have also found that I can't always predict what people will want. What will be hot at one show will be a dud at another. It feels a bit hit-or-miss to me.

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

Apart from the annoyance of having to carry it back home, why not go for too much? It's not like soap is going to go off if you don't sell it fresh (and if it is, shame on you!)

 

[gunsmithgirl]

Well I was unsure how much to take because at most local farmers markets I don't focus on just soaps, I mainly focus on produce because unlike my soaps, I can't take a bunch of tomatoes home and sell them later, so my soaps are always a smaller part of my booth. I am trying to branch into some craft type events to focus on just the soaps and body products at those.
With that being said the festival was this past weekend, I went with around 450 bars of soap and close to that number of lotions & such. Sold out of many items, wish I had made more of certain scents. It went well! It was a 3 day event I had quite a few return customers who bought my products the first day and liked them so much they rushed back to buy more! I think I needed a lot more of some things, probably would have sold out of a lot more but it rained like all day Saturday so that really killed it, most my sales were in the other 2 days. Next time I will know to take more for that size event.